By Dennis Chu on June 17, 2011 • ( Leave a comment )

PIZZA FUSION

Address: 95 Broad Street, Red Bank, NJ 07701

Pizza Fusion was a new place that I heard about when I came back from school. A couple of my friends had been talking about it and it piqued my curiosity. I was initially skeptical at first about the restaurant, mainly because I saw that it had been receiving some less-than-favorable reviews. However, after a game of volleyball, a few of us decided to venture over and check it out. I’m glad that I did, because the reviews I read missed the mark completely.

Being a person that grew up around traditional pizzas such as extra cheese, pepperoni, sausage, and the like, I was happy to see a refreshed take on pizza, utilizing a variety of different ingredients that I would normally not think about pairing together, leading me to dub these types of pizzas “artisan pizzas.” My friends and I took on the Founder’s Pie, which came with chicken, olives, red onions, tomato sauce, and four different types of cheeses (parmesan, mozzarella, provolone, and gorgonzola). It was honestly the first time I have ever tried blue cheese on a pizza before, but I found it to be really great. I loved that the pizza wasn’t greasy at all and all of the ingredients tasted really fresh. The flavors worked out really nicely and my friends and I all enjoyed the pie a lot. It was also an incredibly fast meal; my friends and I were in and out of the store in around 30 minutes.

To those of you who might have read some of the less-than-favorable reviews, I encourage you to give this place a shot. I have a hunch that some of the people who went to Pizza Fusion expecting another New York-style pizza place did not get what they were expecting (instead receiving the flatbread-style pizza) and posted online about how Pizza Fusion didn’t meet up with their expectations. Well, Pizza Fusion’s restaurant concept is not serving up New York-style pizzas; it’s about taking the freshest and healthiest ingredients as possible and marrying them to make flavorful pizza combinations that would really excite your taste buds. From our experience, the staff there did a wonderful job at making our time at Pizza Fusion really positive.

Here are my rankings for Pizza Fusion:

Food: 4.5 / 5
Our Founder’s Pie was really delicious and everything tasted really fresh. Their menu choices of their other artisan pizzas don’t disappoint either.

Atmosphere: 4.5 / 5
The dining room interior is really nicely decorated and all of the table are kept really clean. There is also an outdoor dining area by the streetside (where we ate) that is a great option to have eating out when the weather is nice.

Service: 4.5 / 5
Our waitress was really attentive to getting us drinks and our order, and came back to check on us a few times after our pizza had come out.

Price: 4 / 5
The pizzas from an individual portion size do lean more on the expensive side. However, if you grab three friends and go grab and extra large pie, splitting the bill would only cost you roughly $8 – $10 for the meal, which for a dinner (and how much food you get) isn’t too bad.

Overall: 17.5 / 20 (88%)